Hardy and other members of his family had lived for several years in a building in the 6300 block of South Ellis Avenue that Hayes had owned for decades. Hayes' family members said in 2008 that Hayes evicted Hardy, his mother and other family members after getting a letter from the city alleging drug activity in their apartment.

Prosecutors said one of the family had been selling drugs, and state records show Hardy’s brother, Scottie, is serving a 10-year prison term on drug conspiracy charges brought a few months before the slaying. Court records show that Donald Hardy had been convicted of drug charges himself.

Early in the morning of the attack, Hardy and another man who has not been identified went to the apartment building Hayes owned and lived in, according to a victim-impact statement from Hayes' niece, Zakharyscha Hayes, read in court today.

Hardy knocked on Hayes’ door and Hayes let him in. After the two talked briefly, Hardy poured gasoline on Hayes, refusing to stop despite Hayes’ pleas for him to stop and lit Hayes on fire, according to police and prosecutors.

Hayes then ran out of the building to keep the building from catching fire and to save others who lived there, Hayes' niece said in the statement. According to the niece, Hayes ran 300 feet to a neighbor's home, where he told them that Hardy had set him on fire.

A tenant at the time said she called 911 after she saw Hayes flee from the building, badly burned, and saw him collapse on the neighbor's porch.

At the time of his death, Hayes’ daughter, Lisa Stovall, described her father as a man who worked to improve his neighborhood. She said he helped organize annual block parties, encouraged youths to stay away from drugs and collected back-to-school supplies.

Today, in a victim-impact statement read in court, Stovall said she is still haunted by the vision of her father “running out of the building on fire, rolling in the grass putting (him)self out.”

“My father was my best friend who is gone but not forgotten,” Stovall said in the statement.